Forces of Nature
by hoydenish
Summary: Used to be 37 Point 9 Degrees Celsius, until I was politely badgered into extending that vignette into a longer story. Be careful what you wish for! Chapter 1: Amanda runs away to think, but the feeling follows her (updated a bit from previous version). Chapter 2: The feeling is Lee. Chapter 3: in which a perfectly good hotel bed goes to waste. Mid-Season 3.
1. Chapter 1

It was 2pm, and Amanda King gripped the key to Room 1405 of the Watergate Hotel in her right hand until it bruised her palm. Unless you counted her purse, it was all she was carrying, and she felt like every eye in the lobby was on her. A single woman, checking into a downtown hotel mid-afternoon, without luggage. She could well imagine what they were thinking. She'd never done such a thing, unless you counted that time she'd checked into a flop house with Lee under an assumed name, trying to help him solve a string of murders in the intelligence community.

Lee. It never failed. All her mental roads these days led back to Lee. He was the reason she was here, but not because he would be joining her for some afternoon delight. Not that it wasn't an appealing thought …

She sighed. No, she was here to get away from Lee, and all the disruptive feelings that came with him. She needed someplace neutral, someplace not clouded by his nearness. Someplace where she could think. Or not think, as the case may be. And that was what brought her to the Watergate.

Hanging the Do Not Disturb sign on the door, she dropped her purse to the bed and kicked off her heels. After a moment's consideration, she shed her skirt as well, unbuttoning the tails of her blouse and sinking onto the eider down. Seconds later, she was up again, fumbling with the mini bar lock and considering its contents. Uncharacteristically, what she wanted was a good, stiff drink. A few ice cubes in the crystal highball, and she emptied in the entire mini bottle of Dewars. Scotch on the rocks. Lee's drink. The Agency should be proud of their best man. He was following her around everywhere without any effort at all.

Back in the bed, she took a few small nips, feeling the comforting burn reach her stomach. She was ready to admit defeat. There was no shaking him, so she might as well let her thoughts run loose. At least here, locked away from the world, she wouldn't embarrass herself as she swooned over her partner. Because there was the crux of the problem. The reason for her escape. She was falling for Lee.

She tried to put her finger on the moment when she'd lost control. When the slippery slope she'd been on since meeting him had turned into an avalanche. When he cancelled a date to an embassy party with Leslie, the polite and "perfect" translator, to stay home and cook her steaks? No, she was already tumbling downhill by then, letting him catch her in his arms after the bomb blast as natural as breathing. When he'd confided in her about the truth of his undercover operation during which he feigned being burned out, just so that he could apologize again for his ungentlemanly behaviour towards her? Again, her refusal to give up on him, even after the shocking contact of his palm with her cheek, told her she was already more than a little off-balance, destabilized by his concern and trust. Even during their earliest days, when he vacillated between condescension and over-protectiveness, she had felt, at her very core, that he was worthy of her time and attention. And not just because he was so easy on the eyes.

But lately … Lately, what she had previously dismissed as grateful affection and a mild matinee idol crush had morphed into something far more potent and ominous and all-consuming. It simmered just below the surface like a low grade fever, until she was in Lee's presence, at which point it pulsed through her like a beat for which her pelvis was the drum.

She suddenly found herself wishing she could peel off the layers of assumptions and conditioned behaviour like a discarded skin, revealing the person she knew lay beneath. Her body felt hardly able to contain her newfound recklessness. She was kinetic with it, her increasingly unreliable will and force of habit the only barriers to its bursting forth. It left her feeling restless and misdirected, a trajectory looking for a target. She couldn't say whether Lee was the cause or the effect, but she was trapped in a continuous feedback loop that made her whole body crackle like static.

And then today, it had all come to an unexpected head. She wasn't too certain what had started it. One minute, she had been reading over his shoulder, watching his elegant finger tap out a series of logical deductions on the sheet of paper and listening to the low music of his voice. The next, he was giving her a look so searing it burned a hole straight through her to the other side. Her fever spiked, and she knew she had about thirty seconds to get to the door, or the avalanche would sweep her away. And the Amanda King that everyone thought they knew would never be heard from again.

Ahh, there it was. The nugget of truth at the middle of this maelstrom of feeling. What if she gave in to the rush of the avalanche, and lost sight of herself? She had enough intuition to know that whatever transpired between herself and Lee, it was going to be life-altering, on one level or another. He cast such a large shadow over her life as it was, she could only imagine what it would be like if they …

But maybe a shadow was the wrong imagery. She brightened in his company, transformed by the magic of his tenderness. Instead of being buried by the enormity of him, perhaps he was the key to unlocking this new self she felt struggling to climb to the surface.

A quiet knock, and she knew who it would be. He had no need for homing devices or other intelligence gadgets. She was broadcasting on all channels, and he'd simply followed her signal.

One last sip of scotch for courage, and she walked slowly to the door.


	2. Chapter 2

Escape. He needed to escape. He could feel the static she gave off on the bare skin of his neck, and it was lifting the high-water mark of his pulse, even as he continued to point out the discrepancies in their suspect's report. He hadn't survived over a dozen years in the espionage game without becoming an expert at maintaining a two-way mirror between his outward mask and inner struggles. He could look out, but no-one was supposed to see in. Add that to the list of life certainties that Amanda King had demolished in her quiet way since they'd first met three years ago. Lee Stetson doesn't work with a partner. Boom. Lee Stetson is a loner who keeps his relationships with women physical and transient. Crash. Lee Stetson won't let anyone near his heart ever again. He could feel that one coming down, not with a bang, but a whimper.

He'd known this day would arrive, but still had no plan of defence. She was going to wash over him, soft and soothing as a wave, and then she was going to break on his hard edges. He knew it as surely as his heartbeat. Her gifts were manifold, but she was no alchemist. In reaching out to him, she was only going to hurt herself.

It wasn't that he didn't want her to try. His life begged for her gentle touch. But he was just unselfish enough to acknowledge that it couldn't last, exquisite though the temporary respite from loneliness would be. And then what? Salvation at arm's length was better than no hope of salvation at all. He needed to escape where he could be alone and recalibrate. He turned to her, some ready excuse on his lips until he met her fluid gaze and lost his will to do anything but stare. A roar like the ocean filled his ears, and pulled him towards her.

She was out the door before he knew what was happening, and he breathed out a shaky sigh. Grabbing his coat, he made his way to his car. He desperately needed to go somewhere and clear his head. Had it not been for her abrupt departure, he would have kissed her, right there in his office, and caught up in her undertow he knew he would not have been able to stop.

Driving aimlessly, he recited the familiar litany of his sins against Amanda. How he'd rubbed her nose in his relationship with Leslie, perversely relieved by her jealousy. How he'd whipsawed her steadfast loyalty to him during the Brackin case, hitting her then confiding in her then drawing his gun on her then kissing her hand. And then there was his greatest transgression of all: how he hid his growing admiration and need for her behind a cool façade of condescension and indifference. He hated himself on her behalf.

There, it was working. Reminding himself of all the reasons he was wrong for Amanda was a reliable antidote for the buoyant feeling that she brought to his heart.

Looking around, he realized he was on the Potomac Parkway, and decided to pull into the Watergate for a drink at the bar. Entering the lobby, he was shocked to see her familiar form as she walked towards the elevators, and only just managed to dodge behind a pillar before she could turn and spot him. What the hell was she doing here, going upstairs at 2pm? He struggled to find any reason except the obvious one, and failed miserably. Grinding his teeth, he made note of the floor that her elevator stopped on, then punched the call button violently.

The only thing that hurt more than the fact that she was meeting some guy for an afternoon assignation was the knowledge that he had driven her to it. He should have expected this. He had mercilessly led her along with no idea of ever letting her in because he couldn't help himself any more than he could deliberately hurt her. So why shouldn't she seek relief in someone else's arms? He'd certainly done the same himself, more than a few times. Somehow, that wasn't a reassuring thought.

Arriving on the fourteenth floor, Lee stalked down the hall. He had no idea what he was going to do when he found her. Punch her lover in the face, most likely. Apologize profusely for the million mixed messages and confused signals he'd been sending her way of late. Lay her down on the cool hotel sheets and speak to her body in a coded language they could both understand, his hands on her skin like morse …

The Do Not Disturb sign on Room 1405 still swung lightly on the door handle, and he listened intently for voices from within. Hearing none, he faltered. Jealousy and blind rage had brought him this far, but only courage could bring him to knock. Alone or with company, there would be no excuses for his intrusion, only the naked truth of his need for her to be his and his alone.

Raising his hand, it hovered over the wood for long seconds before he closed his eyes in defeat and knocked.


	3. Chapter 3

His back was already turned when she opened the door.

"Lee." His shoulders slumped and he stopped his passage back down the hall, but he wouldn't turn to look at her.

"I'm sorry, Amanda. I shouldn't be here." She had never heard him sound so defeated.

"It's a little late for that now, don't you think?"

His sigh was his only answer. She was going to have to say just the right words, to keep the fragile element that was between them from breaking down into its baser components.

"I think I knew you would come. Why else would I have poured you this drink?"

A sharp look over his shoulder, and his breathing stalled. She was leaning against the door jamb with a glass of scotch in one hand. His glance slid down her body from her loose blouse, barely covering her hips, over her impossibly long bare legs to her red-painted toenails, and back up again until he finally made contact with her eyes. Everywhere his gaze touched her, her skin tightened as though hit by a blast of cold air. She had a sudden mental image of an advancing avalanche, and shivered.

"I thought …" he cleared his throat, trying not to betray how off-balance he was feeling. "I thought maybe you were … you know … here with someone."

She chuckled ironically. "I was. I was here with you."

He shook his head, not understanding what she meant, but profoundly relieved.

"You'd better come in. I'd rather not be seen in the hallway dressed like this." Unbidden, his eyes tracked down and back up again, and this time he let her see the naked hunger behind the mask before lifting the proffered glass from her hand and brushing past her into the room, taking a long gulp in the futile hope that it would still his chattering nerves.

She let the door swing closed and made her way to the bed, where she sat up against the headboard and tucked her legs beneath the covers. He scanned the room, then made his way over to a chair by the window, far enough away from her that the urge to push her flat against the mattress and dive into her depths could be held in check, if only barely.

Long minutes of silence, broken only by the sound of the ice in his glass as he finished off the scotch.

"I don't want to hurt you." They were equally surprised to hear the rough edges of his voice break the impasse.

"You hurt me every day, Lee." she stated plainly, and he flinched, although it was no different from what he had been telling himself earlier. He felt like he was being pulled hopelessly away from where he wanted to be, the promise that life could be infinitely better and sweeter vanishing on the horizon.

"You hurt me when you pretend not to notice me. You hurt me when you act like I don't matter to you, when I know that I do. You hurt me when you try to convince yourself that you don't want me as badly as I want you." she finished in a whisper.

"Amanda …"

"No! Let me finish. I need to get this out there, before it ruins everything between us. I know, Lee, why you've held back. Why I'm the only woman that you're attracted to that you haven't subjected to the usual Stetson onslaught. And I'm scared too. Scared that we'll break all the good things that we've built over the past three years. But that's going to happen anyway. How many more days like today do you think we can handle, before one of us can't take it anymore and gives up? So if that's the alternative, doesn't it make so much more sense to give ourselves the right to try? Because I can't speak for you, but I've never failed at anything that matters to me this much."

He stood and made his way to the side of the bed, resting his hip beside her.

"You're so much braver than me." he whispered, and she could hear the tremble of fear in his voice.

"Of course I am." she smiled gently, and he leaned his forehead against hers, inhaling the sweet smell of scotch on her breath.

He had been wrong to compare her effect on him to that of a wave. She was the tide; less immediate, but more relentless. If he let her, she would ebb and flow over him, polishing him until he was smooth and bright like sea glass.

"I should go." he breathed, sounding unconvinced.

"What a waste of a perfectly good hotel room." she answered, equally equivocal.

"I may not know much about this sort of thing, Amanda. But I know I want to do it right. And right doesn't start on a Tuesday afternoon at the Watergate. It starts with me asking you out for dinner, and taking you dancing, and telling you how lovely you look in that skirt you're not wearing right now."

She blushed, retroactively shocked at how brazen she had been. He leaned forward and let his lips linger on the skin of her temple.

"Don't get up, or I'll never make it to the door. I'll see you at the office tomorrow. And then we can talk about our plans for the weekend." he breathed in her ear, sending needles of ice and heat through her veins.

He stood up then, gathering his suit jacket and opening the door before finally looking back at Amanda, who was tracking his every move. A wink and a rueful shake of his head, as though he couldn't quite believe what he was about to do, and then he was gone.

She sat for a long time, replaying the events of his visit. She conducted a mental inventory of her emotions: hopeful, nervous, flattered, excited, and frankly astonished that they had blindly stumbled onto the path towards happiness with so little collateral damage. Perhaps she had been wrong to liken the effect he would have on her life to an avalanche. This wasn't going to be a single, cataclysmic event; but rather the slow layering of beauty and wonder that didn't bury, but rather transformed what it touched. She smiled as she settled on the correct metaphor.

Lee wasn't an avalanche. He was the snow.

The End. (I'm as shocked as you are that he left. But hey, I managed to write something that could actually fit into canon. That's something.)


End file.
